Never Ending Lightbulb
by Matthew Sparkes, London, UK on 06.22.07
A UK firm has developed a bulb that is more than 3 times as efficient as CFL bulbs and will burn brightly for decades. They claim that it will burn for so long that the building or appliance that contains it will wear out before the bulb does.
The traditional light bulb remained the way it is for so long because there wasn’t enough of an incentive to change. No one bothered to develop newer, more efficient designs because they were so cheap to produce. They waste 95% of energy and don’t last long.
That is changing now with CFL bulbs, because the green movement is providing an incentive to change. Now they are becoming even more advanced. The Economist is reporting that a team of researchers has developed a bulb that lasts, for all intents and purposes, forever. It’s also far more efficient, converting more energy to light rather than heat.
UK Company, Ceravision, have created a new bulb design that doesn’t use electrodes, so cannot burn out. It uses a magnetometer to bombard a small piece of aluminum oxide with microwaves to create an electrical field. Gas is then passed into a hole in the aluminium, in order to ionise it and create a glowing plasma. Traditional bulbs convert only 5% of energy to light, CFLs make use of around 15%, but this new design converts over 50%.
There are other bonuses as well, both financially and environmentally. The bulbs are expected to last for decades, so will need replacing far less often. This means less carbon emissions from production, and lower costs. It also doesn’t have the traces of mercury that CFL bulbs have, so will be easier and cleaner to dispose of once it does burn out. ::The Economist
See also ::Ikea Give Out 60,000 Free CFLs ::Green Light Purifies Air
Electromagnetic waves? What will the milli-rad exposure be at one meter distance? Unless that is addressed up front this goes no where.
Major error in your post
"Traditional bulbs convert only 5% of energy to heat, CFLs make use of around 15%, but this new design converts over 50%."
that would mean it is 10 times less efficient than an incandescent. It should read 5% of energy to Light.
My concern about CFLs is that in my industry, theatre, lamps need to be dimmable. So my question is, can these be dimmed or are they on/off only? If they are dimmable they would make a great alternative especially if they will last longer
FYI--it's a magnetron, not a magnetometer. As for the other comment about radiation exposure, microwaves are non-ionizing, and they only heat tissue.
In any case, this technology is similar to the sulfur lamp, which uses microwaves to excite sulfur. See the wikipedia article on them here.
The article says the lamp life was less of an issue than the electronics of the magnetron.
The real issue is the radio interference lamps like these cause. It is difficult to shield the lamp for RFI purposes.
I agree with the previous comment. Great technology, but unless the microwaves are in the bluetooth wave lengths, then I'm not sure how far this will get. Maybe they will shield its inner core. Will it be safe?
The recycling office in our area said that traditional microwaves are difficult to recycle and advised me to stay away from buying another one. How exactly will this light bulb be easy to recycle?
Cost... cough cough.. cost? If they cost too much all their efficiency wont mean anything. More likely we'll see a cheaper efficient solution come from the LED area before these catch on.
They (researchers and military) already made a similar light with microwaves. It had a completely sealed sphere of glass inside of it was a small amount of sulfur power. Hit it with microwaves and boom, brilliant efficient light. They stop making it because could not contain the microwaves.